Actually the real beginning came roaming the woods and gorges of Victoria Park in Truro Nova Scotia as a kid of somewhere between ten and twelve. There in the wall of a waterfall a quartz crystal perched, single small and magnificent, pure perfection in a hole in the rock. Neighbors introduced me to the Bay of Fundy shortly after. But it wasn't until 1982 that I started cab cutting. Pretty rugged stones, initially; I still keep one early cab with its beginner's flat spot on the dome to show my students: "see, you are not alone." But two years ago my Fundy gems were invited to the Munich Show, whose theme that year was agate. .....click here

With stones that I'd both dug and cut, the question arose, "now what?" Particularly since you can buy an agate from India for 17 cents or so. So I taught myself elementary silverwork from a book by Shar Choate. One day Kim Cullen, a custom silversmith at the time my home town Moncton, Canada asked me to recut some stones. In the process I showed her some of my first silver pieces. She said "not bad." I said, "Well it is a hobby." I'll never forget what she answered: "Well, you should stick with it. You never know where it may take you." Want to see? click here>

Rutilated quartz, lapis, charoite, labradorite, tourmaline cat's eye, ammolite and of course opal opal opal. I seldom cut calibrated;it's more of a constant interplay between the material and my own esthetic eye. Hence the shapes are seldom standard and the materials tend to be unusual. click here

The urge to expand one's artistic horizons is constant and compelling. Perhaps it's a curse; an imperious rider: the moment you get good at one thing it jumps you, digs the spurs into your flanks: time to move on, move on, change direction, work something new. In my case it led me to tackle stone on a much larger scale, for the past few years carving decorative bowls from a dramatically patterened local alabaster. Want to see? click here

Another consequence of the ruthless rider, these are some of my pieces in larger stone. Some are whimsical, others are explorations, all embody the love of stone.click here

Yet small gems are still a joy. It is singularly satisfying to coax a gem out of a piece of rough stone. But there's also science in it, optics, crystallography. The ruby opposite is from a gem science story I did for Lapidary Journal in November 2006. Of course you already know all about the importance of factors like cutting to correct angles based on the index of refraction. If not, do some homework. But if you do know, and you value gems that are cut to exacting standards, that do give maximum brilliance, often in unusual, specialty cuts....click here

As you may have gathered I'm mainly a maker. But this with one big proviso: in shaping cutting polishing, nothing is added, nothing put into the stone. Only what is already there is brought out, amplified, revealed. In that sense you could call this site a book of revelations. Yet still the pleasure of digging is very much alive - albeit there's less time for it; far less than I'd like. So my repertoire of Bay of Fundy specimens is going to be both limited and sporadic. ....click here

Thirteen Bay of Fundy localities are mentioned in the late John Sinkankas' massively comprehensive "Gemstones of North America" as places to collect quartz gems (agate, amethyst, jasper). I've been to all of them, and from time to time still do guiding. It is my intent, in this section, to take you along on photo-tours to some of these places, give directions how to get there and photos of the locations and what you may find. But please note the word intent.....click here

Just like the field trips above, this one for the moment dwells in the realm of intentions. Indeed the two topics may be consolidated - probably will be - into a relaunch of "Lapidary World," my online lapidary magazine - surely among the world's most sporadic publications, with one issue out, only one, two years ago, just before Tucson, and not so much as a typo correction since....click here